Prof. Dr. iur. Mark Pieth (born 1953) is since 1993 Professor of Criminal Law and Criminology at the University of Basel, Switzerland. Having completed his undergraduate degree and his PhD in criminal law and criminal procedure at this university, he spent an extensive period of time abroad, most notably at the Max Planck Institute for Criminal Law and Criminology in Germany and the Cambridge Institute of Criminology in the United Kingdom. After practicing for a time as a private barrister ('Advokat'), he returned to his alma mater to complete his post-doctoral ('habilitation') thesis on sanctioning and other aspects of criminology.

From 1989 to 1993, Prof. Pieth was Head of Section - Economic and Organised Crime at the Swiss Federal Office of Justice (Ministry of Justice and Police). In this role, he drafted legislation against money laundering, organised crime, drug abuse, corruption and the confiscation of assets. As a government official and later as an independent consultant, he also acquired extensive experience in international fora, amongst other things, serving as Member of the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering (FATF), Member of the Chemical Action Task Force on Precursor Chemicals and Chair of an intergovernmental expert group charged by the United Nations with determining the extent of the illicit traffic in drugs.

From the mid-1990s to the present, Prof. Pieth has undertaken a range of functions at the international level. Since 1990, he has chaired the OECD Working Group on Bribery in International Business Transactions, also participating in the Wolfsberg AML Banking Initiative as a facilitator (see www.wolfsberg-principles.com for further information). In spring 2004 he was appointed by the UN Secretary General to the Independent Inquiry Committee into the Iraq Oil-for-Food Programme. More recently, in autumn 2008, Prof. Pieth was made a member of the Integrity Advisory Board of The World Bank Group (IAB), advising the President of Bank and the Audit Committee on integrity issues.

Within Switzerland, Prof. Pieth has assumed various presidencies and memberships of national commissions, including the Expert Group of the National Research Programme on Violence and Organised Crime, the Federal Commission on Data Protection in the Medical Profession, the Swiss Federal Gaming Commission and the Consultative Commission to the Federal Administration of Finances on the Prevention of Money Laundering. He continues to consult corporations, international organisations and foreign governments on issues related to governance and to publish extensively in the field of economic and organised crime, money laundering, corruption, sanctioning and criminal procedure. He has formerly served as Dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Basel.